Regaining the site of the trap, he whispered to me: “We

supplies with which we had started had been consumed, and the work of

feeding the troops off the country had to begin at that point. To

get flour, wheat had to be taken from the stacks, threshed, and sent

to the mills to be ground. Wheat being scarce in this region, corn

as a substitute had to be converted into meal by the same laborious

process. In addition, beef cattle had to be secured for the meat

By hard work we soon accumulated a sufficient quantity of flour and

corn meal to justify the resumption of our march on Springfield; at